See a gallery of photos from Tuesday, Nov. 30

Science got a bit more sophisticated at Ellis Middle School Tuesday, as scientists and technicians from the Hormel Institute gave seminars and taught science classes for seventh and eighth graders.

Eighth graders in morning classes listened to a talk by Dr. Saleem Bhat, who heads up the Molecular Chemoprevention and Therapeutics section.

“Scientists are so busy there, this is not something they often do, where they go out into the public, they go out to the public schools, and they share presentations about what they’re doing,” Tom Fritz, a science teacher at Ellis Middle School, told students during class Tuesday.

In the afternoon, students were able to perform various experiments and obtain data using equipment loaned out by the Hormel Institute, including micro pipetters and digital balance scales. This is the second year the Hormel Institute has come to Ellis to hold science lessons.

“It’s a nice feeling you get,” said Todd Schuster, senior lab technician at the Hormel Institute. “It could help them see what you can do, that science isn’t all just mysterious and that people get jobs.”

Students, for their part were very thankful to the Hormel Institute for sharing some of their tools and science lessons.

“It’s a real honor,” said Connor Lee. “They don’t really do this stuff. It’s just pretty cool to come down and show us some cool science tools, the stuff they use, (to) show us what they’re doing and working on.”